


Allowances

by FictionalFeather



Category: Durarara!!
Genre: Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Implied or Off-stage Rape/Non-con
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-22
Updated: 2013-03-22
Packaged: 2017-12-06 03:45:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,031
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/731103
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FictionalFeather/pseuds/FictionalFeather
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A study in what happens when Izaya is mugged and Shizuo's the one who finds him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Allowances

**Author's Note:**

> So this is my first foray in DRRR!!, and I'm not too sure how I feel about it. As such, I'm not sure if I'll be continuing it, even though it ends fairly abruptly and leaves everything wide open. But I thought I'd post it and see what happens. Maybe I'll get inspired and keep going.

Fucking city.

Fucking nighttime with its darkness and creepy fucks and shadows.

Fucking rowdy groups of wanna-be gangsters laughing too loud and reeking of alcohol, strong enough the stench of it was affronting.

Fucking air that was too cold already.

Fu-

The fuck?

Fucking drunks in dark alleys.

Except something about the muttered cursing and the trembling he can easily see in the person’s limbs as they struggle to stand, one arm braced on the wall, makes Shizuo ill at ease. It’s way early to be that plastered anyway, so when he realizes he’s just standing there watching, he figures he probably ought to do something.

“Oi,” he calls out, putting enough command in his voice to garner attention, the form freezes. A moment passes, both stopped, and Shizuo steps forward.

“You alright?”

“Fine,” returns a harsh voice, definitely male, but the man doesn’t move otherwise, still trembling, swaying, leaning on the wall. So Shizuo keeps walking because he’s starting to get a little pissed off because, really, he was just trying to help, and when he’s a little closer he can see the shimmer of broken glass in the man’s hair, down the back and shoulders of his half-off jacket, on the street, glinting in the dim starlight, and that had to be blood he was seeing, too.

“Oy,” he says again, softer this time, and he’s maybe the length of a single decent jump from the guy when whoever it is turns and fuck if Shizuo doesn’t stop and stare because that’s _Izaya._

That’s Orihara Izaya standing there with a head wound from a bottle from behind, one eye already looking swollen, blood covering everything beneath his nose, jacket falling off and shirt torn, one hand holding up pants that are undone and sitting low enough to give off sickening implications.

Izaya’s staring at him with his almost feral glaze over his eyes, breathing shallowly with a raspy wheeze, and the part of Shizuo’s mind that knows about things like that is telling him that there’s a least a few cracked ribs in there, if some of them aren’t broken.

Neither of them are saying anything, and Shizuo knows that he’s only silent because he’s still a little shocked at who it is that he’s caught like this, and he really doesn’t know what to say. ‘Are you okay?’ is out, because he knows Izaya would spit ‘yes’ at him even when he’s obviously not, and ‘What happened?’ is just inappropriate when it’s again, sickeningly obvious what’s happened.

And Izaya’s probably waiting for him to say something first, because if Shizuo just walks away right now, they can tuck this away and nothing changes; this memory will not affect their actions. This very moment can exist in limbo if they both refuse to give it life. Izaya’s’ got to be waiting for Shizuo to turn and leave so this can happen, so they can go back to their acidic comorbidity, because if he speaks first, Shizuo will answer, and that will be the end of things.

But that’s too bad for Izaya, because Shizuo hates him.

“Can you even walk?” It’s taunting, maybe harsh for a victim, but hey, this is Orihara Izaya he’s talking to, and those bloodied lips curve into something – Shizuo honestly can’t tell if that’s a smile or a snarl – that says he’s no victim.

“Fuck you.” But he doesn’t move.

And Shizuo is at a loss now. What the hell does he do?

He might just walk away; Izaya doesn’t want any help, and in the dimness it’s not easy to tell how much he might actually need.

He might call the cops, but then Izaya would tell them he did it.

He might…take Izaya home?

“Where do you live?”

Izaya stares and rasps, and Shizuo isn’t really sure why he’s asking that. It’s not that he wants to help the flea.

“Why?”

Shizuo shrugs.

It’s more that he wants Izaya off his mind. He could leave now, give Izaya what he wants and walk away, but he’d spend most of the night wondering what the hell happened to him and who the hell was enacting such violence, and it’d mean a night of a headache that’s just not worth it.

He’s prepared to play concerned citizen to save himself. Just imagine Izaya’s a random civilian. People are mugged every day. And raped.

(That may not have been so true with Celty as omnipotent as she was lately, but it still happened far more often that it should have. Only because of the person was this a surprise encounter.)

Izaya gives him this look like he’d rather sleep in the alley than say anything to Shizuo again, but when he tries to stand up straight and his eyes clench shut, Shizuo sighs to will away a growl of frustration and steps even closer. He hates violence probably not as much as he hates Izaya, but he’d help anyone who looked like that, out of sheer sympathy. Call it a character flaw, but anytime he saw a beatdown, he’d hardly be waiting to hear the perp’s side of the story.

So Shizuo finds himself flinging one of Izaya’s arms over his shoulders, jaw clenching with the effort it takes to hold back a flash of rage in response to the shorter man’s incensed glare and scoff of disbelief.

“You should just be glad I’m not going to carry you, because I’m sure it’d be a hell of a lot easier on us both.”

“I did not say I wanted your help at all, or anyone else’s, but especially not yours.”

Izaya’s voice is low and so impassioned, just so full of emotion and maybe pain that Shizuo forgets to be mad.

“You’re getting it anyway.”

Izaya says nothing to this, and Shizuo can’t really blame him – he remembers breaking ribs, that incredible pressure and the intense feeling of everything pushing everything else in ways they shouldn’t to make this piercing burn throughout your entire chest that made you wish you didn’t have to breathe it hurt so bad – but there is a cold hostility radiating off him that Shizuo has never before experienced. He’d grown accustomed to the infuriatingly playful, taunting mood Izaya was most often in, like a knife was his favorite instrument of teasing, but this closed-off aura he’s put on is…haunting.

But Shizuo has already made his decision, and makes the walk to his apartment stooped over from the height difference just enough to make him grind his teeth as he watches the way Izaya walks. Half his weight is on Shizuo despite his protestations, but it seems more for balance than anything, because it’s almost like he refuses to limp. He’s bent forward, his free hand pressed over his side in the universal sign for ‘I’ve taken a hit to the ribs,’ but he walks so stiffly, steps too perfectly even and measured, that it’s painfully obvious to Shizuo, pressed right against him, what injury he’s trying to hide, even though Izaya’s face remains fixed in an immovable glare, staring straight ahead and not twitching to eye the sparse passersby who mutter and point.

Up the steps, through the door, and Izaya slides away from Shizuo as soon as there’s something else to lean on. Still locked in a scowl, his eyes now roam the space with calculation still, incredibly, looming behind them.

“You live in a shithole,” he judges.

“Thank you. And don’t pretend you didn’t know that already.”

Izaya looks at him and smirks, and it should be so familiar it makes Shizuo punch him back through the door, but when it’s on a face covered with his own blood, Shizuo feels like turning away in horrified disgust.

Instead he stares, hands in pockets, until Izaya closes his eyes and lets his head fall back.

“Are we going to stand here all night?”

The tease is back in his voice, though it only makes Shizuo want to laugh in his face and accuse him of using is as a defense mechanism.

“I’m calling Shinra,” he mutters as an answer, but Izaya makes a lunge for his phone that’s so hindered Shizuo doesn’t even have to jerk it away.

“No. No doctors.”

Cold again. Hostile rage pouring from those eyes right into Shizuo.

And now Izaya’s pale and panting because that sudden move had probably hurt like hell.

And of course Shizou’s first thought is to say ‘Fuck you’ and keep dialing, but he’s caught by the stare pinning him down.

“Playing tough guy, flea?”

“I don’t need a doctor,” he says, straightening up, and it’s supposed to be Izaya going back to playing it cool, getting his dignity reigned in again, but he’s failing so miserably and it’s pissing Shizuo off because it’s so _wrong_ , for him to be standing there not quite straight, bleeding and pale, in his fucking house, looking so displaced from his beloved scheming persona.

He snaps his phone shut and raises both eyebrows – ‘oh really?’

“What I _need_ ,” Izaya answers his unspoken question, “is a long hot shower and some damn alcohol and good night’s sleep. I hope your bed is at least comfortable.”

His jaw drops at first because his immediate reaction is to ask why the fuck he should be giving up his bed, but he grinds it shut instead because it’s kindof _obvious_ , and he really doesn’t feel like arguing it anyway.

“You’re not supposed to shower.” That’s Shizuo’s way of getting back at Izaya for acting so nonchalant, because there’s an unspoken end to that sentence that’s probably the closest he’ll ever come to alluding to, at least in front of him, the fact that he’s been raped.

But Izaya laughs, and it’s different from his usual taunting joy, but Shizuo has no way of telling if it’s good or bad. On the one hand, he sounds manic, like maybe he’s in shock or pain, but on the other, maybe it’s an actual, real laugh, and what Shizuo’s hearing is genuine emotion that’s been literally pounded out of him.

“Why? DNA? Evidence? Do you really think me incapable of finding them otherwise?”

Shizuo’s so confused, so jostled by Izaya’s changing moods, trying to decipher when he’s putting on a persona and when he either can’t or won’t.

“Even if you decide to go against me and get the police involved, you could always just steal my clothes.”

There’s really no way to argue that, because he’s right. If Izaya is going to seek his personal form of justice (read: revenge plus interest), all he’ll need is his memory of the people involved. If he doesn’t already know who they are. (And Shizou knows it’s a ‘they,’ has to be, because the idea of a single person being capable of doing this without drugging Izaya or anything…well, Shizuo himself could do it, but he’d never be so angry as to…definitely ‘they.’)

And letting Izaya bathe himself seems about the kindest thing he can do. Anyway, a bath won’t wash off bruises. Just blood. Blood and…whatever else Izaya doesn’t want him to see.

Shizuo tucks his phone back into his pocket in a sign of begrudging compliance and reaches out to sling Izaya’s arm back over his shoulder and lead him to the bathroom. The shorter man hums in victory, but leans so heavily on Shizuo that he wonders if Izaya’s acknowledging pain now, or if it’s just because nobody can see them anymore.

It’s almost flattering to think that Izaya may be letting his guard down, but under the circumstances, Shizuo can’t count it as a win.

He lets Izaya lean against the bathroom sink and turns to set the water and give himself a moment to try and prepare – he _knows_ Izaya can’t undress himself, even if he felt good enough to try he’d probably end up hurting himself more. But that’s not something he can ask, not with the ice-brittle truce they’d called at some point in the evening. He can’t _ask_ Izaya if he needs helps, because they both know he does but neither of them wants him to say it out loud, and he doesn’t want to draw any more attention, in any case, to the fact that he’s about to strip the person he hates most, so he turns back around without a word.

Izaya’s managed to roll his coat off his shoulders, and it sits on the floor. There are matching bruises around his wrists. His shirt isn’t really salvageable – a tear in the side and one sleeve ripped nearly clean off – so scissors it is. Izaya makes a face as he cuts, and a fresh trickle of red slides from nose to lip. Shizuo realizes a bit belatedly that hit to cause that much blood would have broken it, but that lack of awkward curve meant Izaya had already crunched it back into place.

“You owe me a shirt,” Izaya gripes, but it goes ignored.

The scissors are placed on the sink and Izaya peels his new vest off his shoulders and down his arms to join his shirt on the floor. The state of his torso is nothing Shizuo didn’t expect, but the mess of red, black, and purple that paints abstract thoughts across his skin still makes his lip curl.

He reaches for the button on Izaya’s pants, eyes trained on a spot on his pale neck he judges to be least awkward for them both, but his fingers are pushed roughly away, and Izaya’s back to glaring at him.

“You can leave now,” Izaya says in a way that implies it should be obvious.

And by now Shizuo’s too tired of dealing with the damn flea to wonder if it’s regular old ‘don’t be naked in front of people you hardly know’ instinct that everyone has to some degree, or if there’s something specific he doesn’t want Shizuo to see, so he lets it go. He walks out of the bathroom and shuts the door, and moments later he hears the sound of the water change as Izaya steps under it.

In the back of a bottom drawer, he finds an old pair of gray sweatpants and a plain white undershirt. Neither will really fit Izaya because he’s as skinny as Shizuo is tall, but at least it’s something. He sneaks the clothes into the bathroom, nearly recoiling at the wave of wet heat that surges over him when he opens the door (that also reminds him he never did take his sunglasses off, but what’s stranger is that Izaya never mentioned he was still wearing them), and carries the pile of ruined clothes back out, bagging it and trashing it. His sunglasses are tossed on the table, Izaya’s ridiculous coat is folded over the back of a chair, and Shizuo collapses on the couch, because fuck.

_Fuck._

And what the fuck is he doing?

He is not insane. He does not have a deathwish. Why is he helping Orihara Izaya?

Because he’s a nice person?

He _is_ a nice person, dammit. He abhorred violence.

Except Izaya’s the very person he was violent toward, usually.

So if Izaya seems unaffected by this, can the incident still be considered traumatic enough to excuse Shizuo’s inner peaceful nature overriding his consuming desire to strangle Izaya?

Because he’s still acting like an ass, regardless of-

No.

Except Izaya _isn’t_ unaffected, because he’s here. Shizuo had seen the look on his face, in his eyes, had heard _something_ in his voice. And above all, he had consented to coming. He had accepted help, had allowed himself to be taken to somebody else’s home. Some part of him was bothered, bruised, battered, somehow touched by this, but he’s already come as close as he ever would to admitting that.

But still, it all has nothing to do with Shizuo, except…if it had been anyone else who’d found Izaya out there, the flea would still be staggering his way home. No way he’d be in anyone else’s shower. So in a way it has everything to do with Shizuo. Simply because they hate each other so intensely is Izaya naked in his house.

And Shizuo is confused.

Izaya is nothing but a headache.

He hears the shower cut off and only then realizes he’s been wallowing for nearly an hour, though honestly, he’d expected Izaya to be in there a lot longer.  
Shizuo doesn’t move anyway, doesn’t even think about Izaya possibly needing any help until it’s been a little too long with the water off to be normal. But when he turns the corner into the hallway, Izaya emerges, shirt hanging over one shoulder and carrying the oversized first-aid box – bastard had gone through his cabinets.

Oh well. He should have expected as much.

He rolls his eyes and goes back out to his couch, onto which Izaya carefully settles himself, but with a practiced sigh that gives off the subtle impression of collapsing. The bottoms of the sweatpants have been rolled up, and when he sits, they ride up to show thin, pale ankles, and something about that makes the moment weirdly intimate, and also makes Izaya look comically younger.

“Your hot water really doesn’t last long, Shizu-chan.”

His eyes are closed as he leans back, so Shizuo shoots a glance at the wound on the back of his head – still bleeding or maybe just wet, but it doesn’t look bad. And if Izaya had survived the shower, he should be fine.

“Tends to be more of it when you use a little cold with it.”

Izaya scoffs out a laugh, and cracks open an eye and sits up. Shizuo sits next to him.

With the blood gone, it’s easier to see what’s bruised and what’s not. It’s only now, bandaging him up, that Shizuo sees the short cuts along his neck, shallow like papercuts, where a knife had been held to it. Could very well have been Izaya’s own, because there’d been nothing in the pockets of the pants he’d thrown away – despite not even wanting to touch them, he’d checked that much. No phone or wallet.

One side of Izaya’s torso is a huge mess of red and purple, but he’s breathing easier, if still frighteningly shallow. His back doesn’t look much better- he’ll probably be pissing blood for a few days, with a hit to the kidney like he was wearing. There is of course really only one place he’s worried about, between infection and tearing, but for all he knows, that’s why Izaya had been taking so long. He would never let Shizuo help with that anyway, so he doesn’t ask. He’ll go on pretending he doesn’t know, and he’ll let Izaya keep pretending he doesn’t know Shizuo knows.

He doesn’t know how he’s supposed to help, anyway. Tell Izaya he’s there for him? That he could talk to him? Fuck that. If Izaya doesn’t want to bring it up, he’s fine with that.

“So what happened?” he asks. Finally. Gruffly. Because he does want to know, and Izaya must have been waiting for him to ask.

“I should think that much is obvious.”

He’s so tempted to pull the wrapping around his chest just that much tighter then he needs to.

“You? Caught off guard? Pardon me while I don’t buy it.”

“Pay up and buy it, Shizu-chan. I’m a victim of this wretched city.” Except that damned smirk is back on his face and Shizuo can’t tell that straight out lie from the play on truth.

He pauses for a second, catching Izaya’s red eyes and lighting a cigarette before moving on.

“What is it? Am I too far gone, Shizu-sensei?”

“I’m not your damn doctor, flea,” he growls out, but takes a breath to calm himself when Izaya’s joyous chuckle tells him he’s risen to the bait. “You’re never gonna tell me, are you? I should just shut up.”

“Oh my dear Shizu-chan, it’s taken so long but you’ve finally got the right idea! My hard work is paying off!”

The cigarette is in danger of being crushed with how much he wants to grind his teeth. “I don’t even know how you can talk. You oughta feel like shit.”

“I found some painkillers in your bathroom.”

Shizuo’s hands hiccup in their rhythm.

“Nice stuff. Been seeing Shinra lately, hn?”

Shizuo doesn’t answer him. Izaya’s the cause of the damn ‘stress migraines,’ anyway. But he was right – they were nice. And expensive, even from Shinra.

An offhand thought sneaks in and whispers that he might end up taking some tomorrow, because who knows what effect having Izaya in his house will have. Assuming the louse doesn’t rob him blind. He won’t fool himself into wondering if Izaya already knew where he lived anyway, but now that he’s already inside…

But he stifles a laugh. Izaya may be currently functioning, regardless of painkillers, but tomorrow he’ll need those pills just to move. The day after is _always_ worse, and yeah, Shizuo is going to enjoy watching Izaya suffer, cocky bastard.

His work done, Shizuo sits back and blows a puff of smoke into freedom. Izaya looks a picture of stale haughtiness, all bound up and disinfected with his signature half-smile still refusing to slip.

“Go to bed,” Shizuo orders with as much command as he figures Izaya will let slide, because he really just doesn’t feel like getting into anything else tonight, whether it be a shouting match or a hostile yet informative conversation carried out over a night stuffed too full of vile and roiling contempt, tiptoeing back and forth as they attempted to get somewhere.

Lucky for him, Izaya only gives him a raised eyebrow for the implication that he should take Shizuo’s bed and he walks off without a word.

It’s only a matter of seconds for Shizuo to grab a pillow, hit the lights, and collapse with the impregnable hope that he’ll be able to get any sleep at all.

\--

He’s caught somewhere on the verge of angry, in between exhausted and uncomfortable, with his eyelids just heavy enough to keep him lying down even though he knows that with everything on his mind, it’s just not happening tonight, when he hears a thud and another muffled sound from his room.

He listens for a moment, as instinct dictates when sharing a space with another person, then wonders what he should do, because Izaya won’t call out if he needs help, but he also won’t enjoy Shizuo bursting in one him for no reason.

Eventually he decides to fuck the consequences and go check on his ‘guest,’ because he’s got nothing better to do, but he stops and listens right outside the door and there are these gasps and little noises that are just airy and spaced out enough that really the only thing that fits is Izaya having a nightmare. The idea seems farfetched, but then, so is the idea of a person being able to sleep after a night like that. Put them in a room alone and, if they’re exhausted enough and had a strong enough painkiller to make rest an option, and it’s really not so surprising that even Orihara could be susceptible.

So now Shizuo’s in another predicament, having to decide whether to wake him up or not. It’s definitely tempting, to have something to dangle over Izaya’s head, to be able to tease about those little high-pitched sounds escaping. He’d be so pissed.

But another, much less spiteful side of Shizuo is able to see it as another facet of their ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ approach to the ordeal – how if he woke up Izaya, they’d be forced to confront the reality together, instead of continuing to run separately from it.

By the time Shizuo’s thinking that he’s pretty sure nightmares can be the brain’s way of trying to work through traumatic shit, he recognizes that he’s making excuses for himself and realizes he never really planned on going in the room anyway.

He shuffles back to the couch and lies down and stares at the ceiling and wishes he could stop thinking.

\--


End file.
